Educational Policy During The Obama Administration

These gains have resulted in extra funding, enhanced teacher training and even tutoring. Bush was quoted as saying, “The era of low expectations and low standards is ending; a time of great hopes and proven results is arriving and together we are keeping a pledge: every child in America will learn, and no child will be left behind….” (Bush, par. 5). President Bush has placed great enhances on testing. It is believed that frequent testing in the classroom can be used as a guide to help individual schools build academically. Also, each school would receive a grade for its achievement level and be required to post it for the public to see. The bill insists on higher standards and higher achievement levels for all school. It joins the teachers, principles and education chiefs together in the fight for high education. It encourages great value and instills hope for our country.

The primary goal of any school district’s English Language Learner policy should be to ensure that all students receive equitable access to the curriculum. The Office of Civil Rights memorandum (May 25, 1970) requires school districts to take affirmative steps to provide equal access to instructional program for students with limited English proficiency. The Illinois Constitution guarantees every child from kindergarten through grade 12, access to a free public education; which means, regardless of a child’s home language, he/she deserves a free and appropriate education (Illinois State Board of Education, 1998).

When President George W. Bush signed the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) into law in 2002, the legislation had one goal-- to improve educational equity for all students in the United States by implementing standards for student achievement and school district and teacher performance. Before the No Child Left Behind Act, the program of study for most schools was developed and implemented by individual states and local communities’ school boards. Proponents of the NCLB believed that lax oversight and lack of measurable standards by state and local communities was leading to the failure of the education system and required federal government intervention to correct. At the time, the Act seemed to be what the American educational system

The most interesting parts of Obama’s speech, to me, were the clarifications on his educational policies. His plans for higher education, such as halting student loan payments after 20 years or 10 years for public servants, seemed pretty cool to me. I’m not sure if taking government money to be used for student loans and giving it to parents while simultaneously stopping loan payments after 20 years is such a good idea. Pissing off the entire banking system might not be such a good idea in the long run. Grunts will be fired before CEOs cut their own bonuses, and I really don’t feel like that is particularly conducive to a good financial system.

The greatest concern of mandating “English only” schools in California for example is that 80 percent of the population of students is Latino. Miner further explains, “Good bilingual programs are about more than learning a language, it should be about respect for diversity and multiculturalism (Bilingual Education, 1999).”

I completely agree with you that the Bilingual Education Act of 1968 is a great program that provides assistance to students with limited English speaking ability. With this bill, many immigrant students have the same opportunity to learn in a new language. As you stated above, the Brown vs Board of Education Act of 1954 is one of the most important against the segregation in public school. However, we can say that more need to be done to resolve the problem of racial and segregation in this country.The supreme court had to order and reinforce the segregation ruling over and over in making sure that every student has access to an equal education regardless the color of their

In 1965, Lyndon B Johnson signed the Elementary and Secondary Education Act in an attempt to achieve more equity among minority groups within the education system. Along with the numerous attempts to close the achievement gap came America’s first federally funded state assessments, created with the intention of holding the nation’s schools accountable for providing a quality education for every student. This legislation was revisited in 2001 by the Bush administration with the No Child Left Behind Act, which saw the achievement gap that still existed among ethnic minority groups, but also recognised a prominent gap within poverty- stricken communities. With this came state tests that were more difficult and more frequent in an attempt to further

In 2004, coinciding with the conclusion of President George W. Bush’s first term in office, United States Secretary of Education, Rod Paige, released an essay depicting the successes of his administration. Paige’s department spearheaded the initiative sparked by the No Child Left Behind Act, a set of policies enacted to reform education and provide students with an improved degree of learning more suited to the evolving job market. Paige brings light to the findings of his administration, presenting what he considers to be evidence explicitly showing the successful nature of these programs. Through numerous faults with his argumentation and reasoning, however, Paige’s opinion on the outcome of said policies is highly debatable. To judge

It is no secret that the debate over what is the best course of action to educate our non-native English language students across the country is a highly charged topic that runs from the classroom to Capitol Hill. There have been many shifts in direction and focus of educational programs for English Language Learning (ELL) students during the past century in our nation's history. In 1968, with the passage of the Bilingual Education Act (Title VII of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act) legislation was

During President Bush’s term, government became aware that American schooling needed major improvement. There was a need of a law which would improve the system while using scores to evaluate students as well as their teachers. "The fundamental principle of this bill is that every child can learn, we expect every child to learn, and you must show us whether or not every child is learning," (Secretary, 2002) President George W. Bush said on Jan. 8, 2002, signing ceremony of No Child Left Behind Act. However, this one size fits all approach revealed not be resourceful. "The goals of No Child Left Behind, the predecessor of this law, were the right ones: High standards. Accountability. Closing the achievement gap, but in practice, it often fell short. It didn 't always consider the specific needs of each community. It led to too much testing during classroom time. It often forced schools and school districts into

Bush’s No Child Left Behind (NCLB) federal policy. Both Clinton and Bush administrations regulated freedom of choice within their educational policies. Clinton’s Goals 2000 increased standards for student scores within core subjects. Legislation targeting Title I, required States and school districts to “turn-around” low-performing schools, and in 1993, public charter schools increased to over 2, 000 (www.clinton5.nara.gov). Bush’s No Child Left Behind’s structure demanded high-stakes testing and created provision for privatization of public education, as well as “school choice .” No Child Left Behind not only increased the Clinton’s strong accountability disposition, but it also superimposed a new set of accountability rules that would adversely affect public schools (Porter, Linn, & Trimble, 2005). One significant requirement of NCLB is that each state must adopt challenging academic content standards and challenging student achievement standards. Additionally, states must establish Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) goals for each year from 2002 to 2014—that would culminate in the 2014 goal that all American students would be at or above the proficient student academic achievement standard (P.L. 107–110, 2001). When local educational agencies (LEA) failed to meet their state’s AYP goals, in addition to other criteria, they [LEA] faced the inevitability of losing their accredited status and eventually face school

As part of the 2009 Recovery and Reinvestment Act, the Obama Administration secured $4.35 billion to encourage state-led education reforms known as the Blueprint for Reform. The Blueprint for Reform was a proposal to change the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which was first established in 1965 (Rochefort and Donnelly, 2011, p4). In 2002, President George W. Bush‘s made changes to the Act by introducing his education reform plan, No Child Left Behind (NCLB). Obama‘s Blueprint for Reform proposal involves changing NCLB as well as encourage the adoption of college and career-ready student education standards (Rochefort and Donnelly, 2011, p4). One of the educational programs of the Blueprint of Reform is the Race to the Top program.

Florida is a state composed of diverse cultures and languages. Prior to 1990 there were not any modifications or accommodations in the classroom for English Language Learners (ELL), which had become an increasing issue. During this decade Florida was the third largest state with residents that were not native-born. Historically, Florida has become the home for many individuals who migrated from Central and Latin America (MacDonald, 2004). According to the Consent Decree (n.d.), the Florida English speakers of other languages (ESOL) Consent Decree was a result of the case, LULAC et. al v. State Board of Education, August 14, 1990. This case addresses the civil rights of English Language Learners (ELLs). The plaintiffs in this case were LULAC and Multicultural Education, Training and Advocacy (META) and the defendant were Florida Board of Education. LULAC and META came together to bring justice to students whose native language was not English. The plaintiffs’ sought to implement policies to protect students whose native language was not English in order to create an equal learning environment. For example, English was the only means of communication in the classrooms and students who did not speak or understand the language would find themselves at a disadvantage. Due to the lack of modifications in place, students would eventually fall through the cracks of the school system. This case brought

Former President George W. Bush started off his presidency with a bit of drama. But other than that he got right to work here in the United States. He started with the Tax cuts with hopes that lower taxes would cause more investing resulting in a stimulation of the economy. He believed our economy was on the right track and so did congress which made passing this easy. He then reformed the No Child Left Behind Act making it to where literally no child would be left behind in the education system. He implemented state testing and made it to where if the state did not meet requirements they would be fined. More money was being allocated to school districts for better programs. Because of all of this by the end of his presidency education levels

Diverse cultures within the United States are rapidly developing and growing and the educational sector is the number one target to ensure that English –learners are receiving adequate education. Within the educational sector there are administrators and teachers who are involved in students lives on a daily basis to ensure that education is equal. In order to achieve the vital objective of equality, socio-cultural influences on ELL students, bilingualism and home language use, parental and community resources, and partnerships between families and schools all have to be considered to provide an opportunity for equal education.